


Ask. Plan. Fail.

by sorb_aucup



Series: GerAme Corner [2]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Introspection heavy, after WWI, dawes plan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-03
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 09:41:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27848738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sorb_aucup/pseuds/sorb_aucup
Summary: America, Woodrow Wilson and Charles Dawes discuss Germany in the aftermath of WWI. Alfred broods.
Relationships: America & Germany (Hetalia), America/Germany (Hetalia)
Series: GerAme Corner [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/498019
Kudos: 10





	1. America 1924

"So the idea behind all this is what?"  
Charles Gates Dawes looked at him crooked, and a little rattled. Well, he had just learned - fifteen minutes ago - that there were P - People - Persons - Yes, people who were nations, who owned the lifespan of their nation, reflected its condition... By and large, something that was relatively disturbing to discover. Especially when someone had only taken a few minutes to explain it and you were dragged along to meet a young man who was already waiting, smiling, greeting you, and saying that he was the United States of America. It could certainly throw a person off track.   
"Well - to cut a long story short, we need countries - colleagues of yours? - to form a bulwark against communism. We also need our money back. The Entente needs money to pay us back. Germany needs money to pay back its reparations. So we form a cycle."  
"He can't pay back the money himself?" Alfred looked up.  
Dawes laughed briefly and coughed. "Have you seen Europe, Mr. Jones?"  
Alfred nodded. "Okay, Yeah, I see. So you think loans to Germany makes it our ally?"  
"They owe us."  
"Relationships work through money and power. Even without weapons," the acting president added. "This has been our policy since Roosevelt, and it works."  
The representative of his country looked at him with interest. "Is that so?" He smiled. "All right, people." It was new for this - this Person to be concerned not only with domestic policy and international economic policy. But he had quickly gotten used to his new role, Wilson thought. How did these people learn? Was it the experience of their people that taught them, or did they learn everything on their own?

For a while it was just quiet. The three men sat in their chairs while the afternoon sun fell through the blinds of the unnecessarily large high-rise window. Alfred loved to see the city from up here. "We have gotten involved in a war," he began.  
Wilson raised his eyebrows questioningly. "To protect our interests and our people."  
"And after proclaiming our isolation anew, do we lend money to Europe?"  
The president and the young man who was the country looked at each other. "We will give up our isolation once again," Wilson said "if we have to. And I am convinced that it must be. We want Europe to be stable. We need it. No stable Europe, no one to buy our products as before."  
Alfred sighed inwardly and looked away from the table, to the window, from which the noise of the street came up to them in a subdued manner. He could still remember the words of his second president, which he had heard when he had been an easily impressed little boy, just a few years ago had become a country. 

The big rule of conduct is to expand our economic relations, but to have as little political connection with the countries as possible. 'Europe has a set of fundamental goals that have nothing to do with us. ... It must be unwise for us to be drawn into their politics by artificial ropes, or into the alliances and clashes of their friendships and enmities'.  
Alfred had sucked up every single word.

"What about the others?"  
"You mean the other countries, Mr. Jones? Well, Britain agrees with us."   
Oh, so Arthur shared his views on the peace treaty? Alfred was surprised. Arthur had almost just frowned during the negotiations or put on an expressionless face and listened to the debates. When Alfred had pestered him about it, Arthur had said "I'm conflicted", and aprubtly left the room. "France didn't." Alfred didn't have too much idea about the exact relations between the guys over there, but Francois and Ludwig hated - loathed - each other through and through, could that be? "Italy is particularly angry about their share. Poland is also dissatisfied, but we can't worry about that anymore. We have bigger problems."  
"What about Germany? And the other two, Prussia and Austria? They lost pretty hard. Weren't happy about it either"  
"Well - Prussia is no longer a country. Austria is complaining. Just like Hungary. But, my goodness, one should expect that. Loders lose" It was dismissed with a shrug of the shoulders.  
Alfred pulled his eyebrows together. "And Germany?"  
Silence. "I suspect they hate us."  
"Woah, why, what have we done?"  
"Promise peace." President Woodrow Wilson was too old to make faces, but just now his face looked like an ironic pout.  
"We can be heroes, always." Alfred smiled encouragingly at him. "You've gone to great lengths and tried things. We can do it. We won this war and we will bring them peace! What's wrong?"  
Wilson looked at him, then he smiled tiredly. "I think I'm too old for this enthusiasm." He silently adjusted his pince-nez. "You're being humiliated too much, and that's going to cause trouble. Trouble that is strong 60 million people. We are trying to bring calm to the situation there and we are lending money to Germany. If we do nothing, we will soon have a new war there."  
"Does that have to worry us?"  
He looked into the innocently interested face of the representative of the American people. "Yes. Now that we're no longer isolated, it won't only affect our exports, but us."

Alfred opened the door to his little apartment in Washington, D.C. He was finally home. Alfred F Jones put his shopping down, put away what belonged in the wooden refrigerator, and for the first time since this morning, ploped down on his sofa much too early. It had been a long day. He simply dropped his leather shoes from his feet, got up again and forced himself to clean them up and put on something more comfortable. With a sigh he also cleaned up his socks and decided to make his dinner now. Otherwise he would fall asleep here and now and not get up again until tomorrow morning. A sandwich would be enough today.   
His radio was silent. The thing still fascinated him. But you could only use it when something was on the air, and just now there was nothing. Alfred sat down at his kitchen table and ate his sandwich (munched it with pleasure) in the silence of his apartment.  
Everything was good and the way it should be. The war was over, they had WON; and everything was fine at his home, he thought.  
And he had begun to discover the world anew. He had once seen an unknown continent, made it his home, had grown up there into a nation, and now, after a long time, he had seen the old continent again.  
It had been good to go there and take part in this war. Evil deeds were ended. Invested money was saved. They had made it very clear that they would not let anyone go to their territory or to their people. They had a name in Europe.  
It was really unfortunate to be squeezed together on a small continent like the Europeans, he mused. Two neighbours were way easier to manage than, like, ten or so.  
He was glad that his president felt that Germany had to be punished, but as fairly as possible.  
He didn't even know why he was glad, by the way. Because Germany was after all a part of his people, and therefore of himself, he suspected. It fitted his hero ideal. A hero treated his enemies magnanimously as soon as they no longer belonged to the bad guys, and behaved as it should.   
It could not have so much to do with his people. Many were still angry about the Lusitania and the carpenter's note. He should also feel at least a bit of rejection. But interestingly, his first reaction, after he had recovered from the news back then and calmed down a few degrees, was that he wanted to see Ludwig. The guy who, after all, could get him into a rage first.   
For a long time he had seen war again. A war that left an entire continent maltreated and shocked because no one, no one had ever expected it to last so long, nor did it stop, nor any of them want to give in. Until Alfred's country had joined in. That's when everything had ended quickly.   
I was only when the peace negotiations were over that he had seen Germany.  
In any case, they had neither been asked nor invited to the meetings, and so although Alfred had expected a certain resentment from the Germans, although he did not like the treaty they had drawn up, and although he took over the guardianship of the reparations arrangements, and although he knew that Poland's joy must cause resentment on another side, he had not - expected it. The shock and complete disbelief of the German diplomats had been reflected in the face of the personification of their country. Tired, exhausted like all those who had fought all these years, their eyes filled with consternation until they saw Francois and practically impaled him with glances.   
Ludwig had not spoken a word. Not while his politicians contradicted him, while an entire cabinet declared his resignation and while others finally signed the treaty that made them and them alone responsible for the war, under protest. Alfred had not expected this man - who seemed no older than he, Alfred, himself - to be so numb. The face of his older brother, who accompanied him, had glowed with rage. And although that was the stupidest thing one could do as a conquered country, Alfred had seen Francois with a bleeding, swollen nose after the two brothers had left.  
Since then, his thoughts had sometimes drifted off and back to the hall of the Palace of Versailles, and from there further to the northeast.

I wonder what he is doing right now.  
Alfred would have liked to ask him. What he thought. What he had experienced. To compare what they had experienced. A long time ago, they had known each other after all. But there had been a silent barrier between them, and Alfred, who actually lacked the sensitivity for such things, had not tried to cross it because he had just had other things on his mind.  
Besides, when they met, privately, to talk, to do something together, even though their countries were not on good terms; when they behaved as if they were human beings, it usually led to chaos. They would always somehow mix up their own feelings and their political relationships. It was both beautiful and exhausting. Your private life was not meant to take over. Wasting even a second on what they felt as personalities was not worth it. They did it anyway, of course, but they knew it wasn't worth it. It would always hurt them if they let their feelings come into play as soon as they got down to business. The countries he met could mean to him whatever he wanted; their people and his politics would nevertheless always influence them, the nations. They could not live without breathing their history, being them.  
He would talk to Germany sometime, if the state of the world was different. Or learn to separate politics from his personal interests.  
And yet. A few of his people looked at Europe and traveled there, also to see this foreign country they had fought against. Perhaps he would come along with them one day in the near future. The world was interesting after all.


	2. Germany 2009

Ludwig had a problem. A serious concentration problem at the moment, and the fact that his very human heart had become independent and began to confuse him without even asking for permission.  
He could be satisfied with his current relationships. This crisis caused him headaches and depressed him just like everyone else, yes. A few countries - Heracles - had decided to hate him, Arthur watched him suspiciously, but accepted him - nothing new, things that came and went away in the tide of history and all the squabbles they had plenty. Things like this happened all the time. And now, although nothing - nothing - yes, nothing special or noteworthy had happened between them, he had started - well, he couldn't even name it.   
His thoughts sometimes wandered, reaching a country over the Atlantic Ocean in the West, and he wondered what Alfred was doing. Whenever he needed a quick meal during his breaks, he had stopped going to his standard fish, sandwich, bratwurst and kebab chaines, but opted for the burger chains and wondered, while standing in line, which of those burgers Alfred used to eat during their conferences. And it didn't help him one bit that sometimes, when the two of them weren't talking or shouting but sitting quietly in their chairs and listening, Alfred would look over to him and their eyes would meet.

His oldest memories go back to the end of the 18th century. Everything before thatwas distorted and blurred. He remembered having met Alfred, a boy like him and not yet a country like him. They had played together, chased each other through the forests of the New England Midwest. They had met again in person when some of his people had been hired by Arthur. He had seen America, torn and confused inside, fighting for his freedom, which he did not even know for sure he wanted. And then Ludwig had decided that he would do exactly that, if history would let him.  
When many, many of his people had fled after their failed revolution, fled to Arthur and Alfred, Gilbert had sent him on a journey to look after them one last time. Alfred had grown, and had become a country. They had toured his cities a few times together. But that had been that. The only special thing between them were two huge wars. After the first, when he had been completely confused and so angry that it paralyzed him, Alfred had been the one who had supported him, and he had been grateful for that. Moreover, the time of his first republic had been the time when he had come closer to Alfred, when he no longer knew him only because his people had emigrated to him. But he had not trusted him for a second, and, well, it had not been a wrong decision. After their second war, he had really got to know him. Ludwig was still not always enthusiastic about this guy, but Alfred was no longer a stranger.   
And today... Today they lived in peace with each other, had their disagreements, respected each other and apart from that kept their distance, there was a lively exchange, especially from his country to Alfred's... It was not an unusual and very satisfying state of a relationship between two countries. He remembered the time after the war, when Alfred's culture had been the great example for his people, still was. He had felt resentment and yet, even then he had felt a certain affection for this cheerful American who now and then roamed through his army barracks in Germany. But it had been a quiet, side-by-side kind of affection, and he was sure that this was mainly due to the attitude of his people.   
So when had it begun? When had his feelings, which were normally very compatible with those of his people, begun to take their own path? Germany frustratedly put aside his ballpoint pen. Maybe - yes, maybe it had begun when he saw problems he knew only too well about himself reflected in Alfred's eyes.  
He had always had a weakness for looking after others anyway, hadn't he?   
Ludwig closed his eyes and sighed deeply once. He had to think about that later.   
For now he needed to sort his most pressing troubles. Fact number one: He admitted to himself that he felt something for Alfred. It wasn't love, that much was clear, love was something that needed time to grow and experience - so it was affection. Yes, affection. To even think that it might have been love was nonsense. He could not afford that. Step number one - admitting his feelings was done. Step number two - finding a reason - was what he was working on. And step number three, deciding what to do, what was always the hardest thing for him was waiting to be done. L - Well, love did not give him anything, and was nothing that suited him anyway. He didn't mind deep feelings, he sometimes thought of himself as a hopeless romantic, but this concerned people, literature, others; he didn't want to have chaotic feelings for himself. So he would do nothing for the time being. Just watch Alfred, try to hide it, be close to him without ever overdoing it, and, now and then, meet his gaze.


End file.
